The European Commission (EC) launched a new European Cybercrime Centre (EC3) within Europol, the European law enforcement agency, with an operational budget of 7 million euros (US$9.3 million).

The EC3 has been set up as the focal point in the EU’s fight against cybercrime, helping the Union join forces to dismantle cybercrime networks. It is mandated to tackle three main areas of cybercrime: activities of organised crime groups (such as online fraud), crime causing serious harm (such as online child sexual exploitation), and crime targeting critical infrastructure and information systems in the European Union (EU).

The Centre will collect information from a variety of sources to support investigations conducted by Member States’ authorities. It will also help member states and institutions build operational and analytical capacity for cybercrime investigations, and support their cooperation with international partners.

Further, the Centre will develop a common standard for cybercrime reporting to ensure that serious cybercrime is reported in a uniform way, and hence, information regarding crimes across the EU can easily be accessed and disseminated. It will pool expertise and information from across the EU and promote EU-wide solutions.

“The European Cybercrime Centre is designed to deliver expertise as a fusion centre, as a centre for operational investigative and forensic support, but also through its ability to mobilise all relevant resources in EU Member States to mitigate and reduce the threat from cybercriminals wherever they operate from”, said Troels Oerting, Head of the EC3.

In addition to supporting investigations, the EC3 will facilitate R&D and capacity building in cybercrime and security, and produce threat assessments such as trend analyses, forecasts and early warnings. A Cybercrime Help Desk will be set up within the Centre to gather and process cybercrime related data, and disseminate it to the member states’ law enforcement units.